Caged Bird
by Snow Glows Blue
Summary: When Elrond gets home, the house is empty except for Lindir. At least, it's supposed to be. (Trigger warning: referenced child abuse, hinted domestic abuse.)
1. Chapter 1

When Elrond gets home, the house is empty except for Lindir.

At least, it's supposed to be. Ella's out with his latest boyfriend (Elrond thinks his name might be Orophin), Roh's studying at the library, and Erestor and Glorfindel are in Bodega Bay, probably at the beach. So it should just be him and Lindir.

But when Elrond walked through the door there was piano music playing, and to the best of his knowledge nobody has ever programmed Lindir to do that.

He shuts the front door behind him and the piano stops. Elrond stands perfectly still and perfectly silent, listening; there's a rustle of papers — sheet music — and forty-two paces of precise, even footsteps before Lindir stands before him, hands clasped behind his back.

"Hello. How may I help you?" Lindir's voice is polite but toneless, face as blank as a china doll's.

Well, at least he'd left off the "sir" this time. "I didn't know you played piano," Elrond says. "Who taught you?"

He didn't mean it as an accusation, just a question. But Lindir instinctively flinches away, raises both arms to cover his head and whimpers, which would worry Elrond the most if it weren't for the litany of "I'm sorry, I'm sorry" that pours from his lips.

Elrond waits for the boy — two minutes ago he would've said "the robot" but not now, not anymore — to calm down, and when Lindir does, hesitantly lowering his arms, he says, "Don't apologize for talent, Lindir."

He's still shaking, very slightly but it means he's still scared. "That's not what Cassius said," Lindir whispers, and Elrond's heart shatters.

"Cassius Owen was wrong," he says, more harshly than he meant to, and Lindir fliches away again, though arms stay wrapped around his waist this time and he's silent. Elrond catches himself and says, gentler now, "I'm sorry." Lindir looks up at him with so much confusion that Elrond can't help but wonder just how bad it was for the boy. "It isn't you I'm angry with," he offers as way of explanation.

Lindir watches him carefully again, but doesn't say anything — just nods and leaves, footsteps less even than before.

Elrond takes a deep breath, braces himself, and follows.

He doesn't understand why Elrond cares so much.

They've already given him more than he ever dreamed of when he lived with Cassius: a home. He's never hungry here, and never cold, and when they first purchased him from Cassius he wasn't threatened and lectured but welcomed in with opened arms.

He receives more affection than he could ever ask for as well: Glorfindel gives out warm smiles like they're candy on Halloween (or at least, how he imagines Halloween; Cassius hated the holiday and kept him inside), Erestor curls up next to him on the couch ("Living with Erestor is like having a giant kitten in the house," Elrond said with a laugh when he saw them the next morning), the twin laugh and run around and touch him when they aren't thinking about it (Roh's hand on his shoulder is the warmest thing he's ever willingly touched), and even Elrond is sitting next to him now, making small soothing sounds and holding him close.

And he can't figure out why, because Elrond and his family have given him everything, and all he's repayed them with is a broken machine and a servant who doesn't know his place.

"Lindir." Elrond's voice is soft, his breath warm on Lindir's cheeks. "You're crying again." He moves so that their foreheads brush, "please, tell me what's wrong. I can't help you if I don't know."

Lindir tries to explain, tries to work his way through the seventeen years he spent in Cassius's house, but all he manages is another sob. He hates himself for it — he's a robot, a machine, a hunk of scrap metal designed to serve and only to serve. He isn't meant to feel, and he hates how little control he has.

But if he can't articulate how it was with Cassius (he unconsciously cradles his right hand), he certainly can't articulate that. So he doesn't try, instead leaning closer into Elrond's strength and letting himself cry.


	2. Chapter 2

It isn't until a week later — Thursday afternoon, when Elrond's shift at the bookstore is over and they're alone in the house — that they talk about it again.

Lindir jumps when he notices Elrond standing beside him, but doesn't stop working. "I am a more than adequate cook," he says uncertainly.

Elrond nods and picks up a knife. "Yes," he says, "I know. But I'm bored and cooking is fun. Is there anything I can help with?"

Lindir just looks at him for a moment, but then assigns him a task.

They work in silence for roughly five minutes.

"I know he hit you," Elrond says out of the blue.

He freezes. Doesn't speak, doesn't move, barely even breathes.

"Why did you never tell us?" Elrond asks, pitching his voice low to show that it's a question, not a demand.

The boy's hands are shaking, but any movement at all is a victory at the moment. "I apologize," he says, "it was not my intent to deceive—"

Elrond doesn't let him continue on that train of thought. "I never thought it was, but Lindir, I need you to tell someone when you're hurting." He puts down the knife and turns to Lindir. "Have you ever talked about it, Lin? With anyone?"

He's crying when he shakes his head. "There was never anyone to talk to but Cassius himself," and he's holding his right wrist like it's been shattered. "He made sure of that. Most of his friends didn't know and wouldn't have believed me, except for the couple who were just as bad, and I never knew anyone else."

The tears have stopped. Elrond thinks absently that he should be glad about that. Needless to say, he isn't.

Lindir's looking up at him expectantly; he doesn't know what the boy is expecting but he's expecting something. When Elrond is still for a moment he visibly relaxes and — oh. He was expecting Elrond to hit him, even now.

He leans forward and wraps his arms around Lindir's shoulders and whispers over and over, "you're safe, I've got you, it's over, you're safe." Whether Lindir believes him or not he can't tell.

OoOoO

Five years, three months, and seventeen days before:

Cassius closes the door behind him. "Hello, sweetheart," he says, as sits down on the bed next to Lindir.

"Is there anything I'm needed for?" He hopes there isn't.

"No." Cassius smiles warmly. "I just wanted to check on you." He leans over to the side, closer to Lindir. "Is there anything that still hurts?"

Lindir nods. "My hand and wrist."

He doesn't think he put it back together properly. But then, he was in so much pain he'd barely been able to see straight; under the circumstances he'd done fairly well.

Cassius takes Lindir's right hand between his own. "I didn't want to have to," he says. The guilt that's been gnawing on Lindir's stomach all morning intensifies.

"I'm sorry."

He leans against Cassius and lets himself be comforted by the faint smell of cinnamon and the strong arms wrapping around him. They're warm, but he shivers anyway (five hours ago Cassius dismantled his right hand and threw the pieces across the room and left him to put himself back together, and now they're in close proximity again and Lindir loves his father but can never really predict him) and instantly feels guilty again for his fear.

"I know you are, Lindir-love." Cassius presses a kiss to Lindir's temple.

They sit together in silence for a while longer. Lindir wishes it could always be like this.

OoOoO

Present:

"I loved him," Lindir says, though his throat feels like it's been corked shut. "He hurt me but he loved me, and he hurt me but I loved him back. I still do sometimes."

"I know, Lin," Elrond says, and holds him close. "I know you do."

And they're still and they're silent but Lindir is letting him in now, and neither of them wants to be the first to let go.


	3. Chapter 3

Lindir wakes in the middle of the afternoon.

He doesn't open his eyes, and he definitely doesn't get up. It's not like there's anything to do - he tried knocking on Elrond's door, but it's been locked all day. He doesn't know why.

Footsteps, not heavy enough to be Glorfindel's, and a soft knock. "Lindir? Are you awake?"

"Yeah. Come in."

It feels so weird, sleeping in, not least because he hasn't had a chance to in nearly nineteen years, all of his life. Cassius beat that out of him early on.

Erestor enters, padding in like a cat, and shuts the door behind him but doesn't lock it. "I'm worried about you," he says, and sits down on the foot of the bed.

Lindir does open his eyes then, and sits up. "Why?" What clues has he been giving?

An odd look, like Erestor doesn't really know what to do with him.

"I can't remember ever seeing you smile," he says. "In the past you've worked so hard your hands were blistering before my eyes and you still wouldn't stop; Elrond had to order you to take a break and you aren't even supposed to be able to blister. And you don't flinch at touch —" he lays a hand on Lindir's shoulder to emphasize his point, and brown eyes widen but Lindir doesn't pull away — "but you flinch when Glorfindel calls you love."

Fuck. He does do that. He wishes he didn't, wishes Cassius didn't have such an influence on every single aspect if his life, but he does.

"Lindir, were you abused? Where you were before?"

Abuse. He has a word for it now, and he can't express how freeing that is.

There's a special term for what he went through. It isn't the norm, it isn't expected, and it definitely isn't the default. Cassius was the exception; this is the rule.

Lindir nods, and tears wel up in Erestor's dark eyes. "I'm so sorry," Erestor says, and he's silent after that.

(Erestor's lost in memories of his own, but Lindir has no way if knowing that. Not even Glorfindel knows just how things went with his first boyfriend and Erestor intends to keep it that way.)

(And if he panics, just for a moment, when he wakes up and doesn't realize that it's Glorfindel's arm curled around his waist — if Glorfindel falls asleep every night cuddling with his Erestor and yet wakes up every morning to find them on opposite sides of the bed — if Erestor apologizes for things that obviously aren't his fault and is hesitant to ask for anything — then that's Erestor's business, and nobody else's.)

/

Lindir isn't healed. Not fully, not yet. Maybe not ever.

But there's progress.


End file.
